Experiment in Terror 05 On Demon Wings (16 page)

popes and religious figures that my dad had framed as

artwork were disfigured, their eyes carved out so they only

had black, inhuman holes.

“Who would do this?” my mother asked in a half-

whisper.

Ada shook her head softly.

Only I had an idea of who could have done it, but I wasn’t

stupid enough to say it. My parents wouldn’t have believed

it was Abby in a mil ion years. But they would believe I was

nuts, somehow put the blame on me, and lock me away

somewhere.

As if she heard me think that, Ada turned her head to

look at me as I leaned against the door for support, trying to

keep my hungover eyes focused.

She gave me a strange look, like she was trying to figure

something out about me. Like something about me was

making her think. I had a feeling I knew what it was too.

I raised my brow and twitched my head ever so slightly.

She frowned and then looked back at the room and at

mom.

I know she was thinking that maybe I had done it in my

sleep. Maybe I had forgone the nail polish last night and

decided to raid Home Depot, picking up cans of red paint

before going to town on al of my father’s religious stuff.

I looked down at my hands. There were no signs of paint

on them. There weren’t any on my feet or anywhere else

either. I doubt I would have been able to clean myself up so

wel . The thought made me feel better. What stores would

even be open at three in the morning? Walgreens didn’t

have paint. I wondered if setting up my own security camera

there would be a good idea, though, just so I could stop

being a scapegoat.

“We should cal the police,” I said, my voice sounding

thick.

My mom nodded slowly. It was obvious she was in

shock. We al were.

“Where’s dad?” I asked.

“Church,” Ada said, as if she didn’t quite believe her

answer.

I straightened up and walked into the room. Hangover or

not, someone needed to take charge of this situation and

my mother and Ada were too stupefied to do anything.

“Listen, I think we need to cal the cops now. Then when

they’re done we can clean it. I don’t want dad coming home

to see any of this.”

“But who would do such a thing?” my mom repeated.

Her accent got thicker when she was upset and in that

instance she sounded an awful lot like Creepy Clown Lady.

A weird, blurry feeling settled over my brain, as if thinking

was suddenly hard, like I had layers to get through.

“You cal them,” Ada said, snapping me out of it and

gesturing to the phone in the study. She grabbed my mom

by the arm and began to lead her out of the room.

I blinked hard to wake myself up, then picked up the

phone and cal ed it in.

After I was done, with the police promising they’d send

their nearest squad car over, and placed the phone back in

the receiver, two shrieks resonated from the kitchen.

What now?
I thought as I raced around the desk and ran

down the hal , my bare feet slapping against the hardwood

floor.

My mother and Ada were on the other side of the island,

staring at the sink. I quickly made my way over to them and

froze in my tracks when I realized what they were
really

looking at.

The wide cupboards beneath the industrial-sized sink

were shut and leaking red fluid out of the bottoms and

corners. It seeped out in sickly rivulets until it congealed in a

crimson puddle on the floor.

I hoped there were a couple of cans of open paint back

there and they had spil ed. But as I sniffed the air, it wasn’t

the scent of turpentine that fil ed them, but that terrible raw

meat smel that plagued me many times before. I don’t

know why I had been so naïve to think that someone

painted my dad’s wal s with actual paint. It wasn’t paint at

al .

It was blood.

“I’m going to open it,” Ada said, and made a move for it,

bending down.

“Are you crazy?” I hissed and grabbed her roughly. I

pul ed her back. “You don’t know what’s in there.”

“Whatever it is, it’s messing up my kitchen,” my mother

said blankly. And before I could let go of Ada and go after

her, my mother put both her hands on the cupboard knobs

and swung the doors open.

The body of a headless pig burst out of the cupboard

and onto the kitchen floor with a sick thud, its coat already

more red than pink. It had been split up the middle and its

gooey, slimy organs and entrails spil ed out like an

unraveling rope, splashing the three of us with drops of

acidic liquid as they spread across the bloody puddle.

What I remember next was screaming. Al of us were

screaming and running out of the house and onto the

driveway. Ada went to go vomit in the bushes while my

mother flapped her hands like a flightless bird and I chewed

on the col ar of my t-shirt while simultaneously trying to pul it

down to cover my exposed legs as the morning air nipped

at them.

It was disgusting, is what it was. Disgusting and

disturbing. Where exactly was that pig’s head? I

shuddered. But I wasn’t taking it as hard as Ada and my

mother were. I guess I had a lot more experience with this

stuff than they did. Not that it was a good thing.

“Guys, it’s OK,” I said coming over to them, the rough

bricks cold against my feet. I grabbed my mom’s hand and

squeezed it hard, stopping her useless waving. “Mom, it’s

fine. The police are coming. They’l find out...” I almost said

what,
“who did this.”

She nodded, the whites of her eyes shining spookily as

she surveyed the neighborhood. I know she was thinking it

could have been anyone, that there was someone out there

plotting against her, plotting against her family. It could have

been true. I didn’t know for a fact it was Abby. In fact, since

my dad was a theology professor, it could have been a

number of disgruntled students. Maybe someone he failed.

They would know exactly how to get back at him, how to

disturb him.

That said, it didn’t explain how it could have happened

without anyone hearing anything. And I knew, deep down,

where the dreaded feeling stayed, that it had something to

do with me. This was about me and this was retribution

from a dead girl.

I never thought I could hate a ghost so much.

When Ada was done upchucking (I real y had seen way

too much vomit in the past few weeks), she got a hold of

herself and helped me convince our mom that everything

was going to be fine. Sure, someone came and destroyed

dad’s study and painted pentagrams everywhere with

blood, and there’s a gutted, headless pig in the kitchen and

speaking of that, let’s see where the head turns up, but I’m

sure the police see this kind of stuff al the time. It’s

Portland, man. It’s weird!

At least her arm flapping and psycho eye-rol ing had

stopped before the police car pul ed up. Officers Hartley

and Monroe were the first on the scene. Hartley was young

with a Channing Tatum vibe, dumb-looking but personable,

while Monroe was in her mid-30s, black, pretty and

obviously the brains of the operation.

I only had to talk to them for five minutes before we

entered the house and I ran to my room to put on a bra and

a pair of pants. By the time I joined them back downstairs,

Channing was talking to my mom and Ada in the living

room while Monroe was investigating the house room by

room. She was coming out of the kitchen when she saw me

and cal ed me over to her.

I approached her cautiously, not wanting to get close to

the carcass, which I could smel too clearly.

“Perry, right?” she asked in a concise voice.

I nodded.

“Your mother mentioned that the neighbor’s dog tried to

attack you the other day.”

My jaw tried to drop, but I held it shut against its wil .

“It did,” I said, lowering my voice. “His name is Cheerio.

He’s normal y the friendliest dog around, so I don’t know

what happened. But he went for me like he was going to kil

me.”

Monroe looked over my shoulder toward the living room

and nodded as if she understood. We walked away from

the kitchen, stopping by the front door.

“Do you know why your mother might have told me that?”

I sucked on my lip while I sussed her out.

“No…why?”

“Is it true that this same neighbor who owns Cheerio,

owns a few pigs?” she asked with a tilt of her head.

I nodded as everything started coming together in a

most horrible way.

“This was her pig, wasn’t it?” I asked. Suddenly I felt

extremely bad. Yes, her dog went psycho, but the neighbor

bungled her knee and now one of her pigs was dead and

headless in our house.

“We’re going to go check on that,” she said matter-of-

factly. “I just wanted to make sure you didn’t hold any

grudges.”

“Grudges?”

She didn’t say anything. She let out a sigh from the

corner of her mouth and kept her eyes focused on mine,

waiting for me to figure it out.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “You think I went and murdered

my neighbor’s pig. Her huge honking pig? Dragged it over

here, diced it open, chopped off its head and stuck it under

my sink? Because her dog tried to attack me?”

“Stranger things have happened, Miss Palomino.”

I was nearly speechless. I put my hand to my chest and

tried to smother the rage.

“I’m sorry, but I think you’re barking up the wrong tree

here. This has nothing to do with teaching her a lesson, this

is about teaching my family a lesson. Teaching me a

lesson.”

The officer frowned at me. “Who said anything about

teaching someone a lesson?”

I paused.

Her eyes squinted at me. “Where were you last night?

Were you out?”

I rol ed my eyes. I couldn’t believe the way this was

going. Why did my mom even bring that whole thing up

about the dog? What did that have to do with anything?

“Yes, I was out.”

“With who?”

“A friend.”

“When did you get home?”

“3 a.m.,” I replied warily. “I’m sorry, but am I under

investigation now?”

Monroe sighed and brought out her note pad. She

scribbled something down as she talked, but I was too far

away to see what it was. “I’m just doing my job and trying to

piece together a timeline for when this could have

happened. Obviously, no one in your family saw anything,

but we won’t know for sure until your father gets back.”

My father. That was not going to be pretty.

A low growling noise stopped me in my tracks. To the left,

by the neighbor’s fence, I could see the silhouette of

Cheerio, snuffling and snapping at my presence. Even

though the fence was thick with old knotted wood and a

prickly bush spread out at its base, I entertained the thought

of hopping over it into their yard and teaching
the dog
a

lesson.

“Perry!” I heard my mother’s voice near my ear and I was

suddenly aware that she had been yel ing it a few times

already.

She was at my side, clutching her shawl with her dainty

hand. In the afternoon light, its mint tone matched the fading

grass at my feet.

“What are you doing out here? Where are your shoes?”

I looked down at my feet. I was wearing my pajama

pants from earlier, along with a hoodie. My hair was tied

back into a ponytail. I didn’t know where my shoes were.

Come to think of it, I had no idea why I was standing in the

depths of our back yard, just staring at the neighbor’s

fence. What
wa s
I doing out there? Where had I been

before? Once again, I couldn’t remember.

“What were you going to do to the dog?” she asked

quietly.

I looked at her as if she had two heads.

“The dog?”

“Why are you standing out here?”

“I…I…needed fresh air.”

My mom’s eyes roamed al over my face, her lips pursed

as she thought about who knows what. Probably that I was

a pig kil er. Then she took my hand and said in her extra-

gentle, fabric softener voice, “You look cold, pumpkin.

Come on inside.”

That tone of voice brought back some pretty dicey

memories. It was like déjà vu to high school al over again.

I forced a smile at her as we walked back up the damp

grass to the house. I couldn’t get too wrapped up in what